The utility canal was a nightmare carved into stone and rust, an underground labyrinth that seemed to breathe around them. Every step was a battle. Water lapped hungrily at their boots, cold seeping through the thin soles, chilling their bones. The air reeked of decay and damp moss. Shadows clung to the walls like predators, whispering a constant reminder that they were nowhere near safety.
Kuro led the group, his face hidden under the brim of his hood, every movement deliberate. His eyes flicked over the wet, slippery floor as if he could sense danger before it touched him. Billish trailed behind, her muscles tense, knuckles white on the grip of his weapon. Sinon's rope slithered across the canal floor, the cord soaked and heavy, glinting faintly under the dim light from their flashlights.
Arthur's boots slid on a slick patch of algae, and he cursed under his breath, steadying himself with a hand against the grimy wall. We have to get through this now, he thought, forcing a calm that didn't exist. His mind raced with every scenario—collapse, ambush, drowning. The water soaked his clothes, clinging to him in cold, uncomfortable layers. Every step felt like it carried the weight of inevitability.
Alia's hair stuck to her face, dripping with water and sweat. This is complete hassle… complete madness, she thought, swallowing the bile rising in her throat. The darkness pressed in from every side, and she felt it invading her mind as much as her body. Every breath tasted of rust and wet stone. She shivered, not just from the cold, but from the tension gnawing at her nerves. Her hands were raw from gripping the slick edges of the canal, nails digging into concrete just to maintain balance. Why do we even do this? Why now?
Kaito's father moved carefully, his frame rigid with discipline, eyes scanning every corner. He was silent, but Arthur noticed the tension in his shoulders, the faint tremor in his fingers as he navigated the water. Andreo muttered something under his breath, mostly a string of curses that were half-lost in the echoing drip of the canal, but Kuro didn't even glance back. Michael, usually imposing, had his jaw tight, every step measured, wary of a sudden collapse in the metal grates above or a trap concealed beneath the water's murky surface.
Sinon's rope was their lifeline, stretched taut across the canal, offering a path when the stone gave way beneath them. It was frayed at the edges, but solid enough for now. One by one, they clambered across, clothes now soaked through, mud and moss clinging to skin and fabric, dragging them down with every step. They were a procession of wet, shivering shadows.
Arthur's mind wandered to the what-ifs—the failures they couldn't afford, the deaths he might witness. Every second counts, every mistake could be our last. His fingers brushed a crack in the wall; it was slick and cold, but it anchored him to the present. His breathing was shallow, ears straining for anything that wasn't the steady drip of water, anything that signaled danger.
Alia, meanwhile, felt her energy draining, both physically and mentally. Her body was weighed down by the water, but her mind was a storm of frustration and fear. I can't even think straight… this isn't even about fighting, it's about survival through this hell. Every step was a battle against exhaustion, every slip a threat to the fragile thread holding her resolve together.
Finally, after what felt like hours, the faint outline of the main building loomed ahead, a dark silhouette against the faint light filtering through a cracked grate above. They reached the wall that separated the canal from the interior, slippery from condensation and neglect. Sinon tied the rope to a rusted hook, muscles straining, wet sleeves sticking to her arms as she hauled the cord across. One by one, they climbed, bodies slick and sliding against the grimy metal. Water cascaded down in thin, cold streams as they emerged into the air of the main building, drenched and shivering.
The room they entered was small, dark, and damp. The smell of mildew was suffocating. Shadows pooled in the corners, creating shapes that twisted unnervingly in their minds. Kuro stepped forward, kneeling to pull a folded map from his bag. The paper was damp at the edges, curling from the moisture, but the ink held. He spread it across a rusted table, the water dripping from his coat onto the floor.
"This is our way," Kuro said, voice low, almost a growl. His finger traced lines across the map, moving through the canal system they had just traversed. "Utility canal here, maintenance rooms here. Our entrance and exits, security cameras, weak points. Every step we've taken, every challenge, was accounted for."
Arthur's eyes flicked between the map and Kuro. We can't falter now… it's all coming down to this. One slip, one hesitation, and it's over. His soaked clothes clung to him uncomfortably, but the focus in his mind sharpened.
Alia's gaze was drawn to the shadowy corners of the room. Dark, wet, suffocating… this is what he meant by madness. Everything we planned, everything we hoped for—it feels like walking blind into some ritual of chaos. She clenched her fists, water dripping from her hair onto the floor, soaking the map a little at the edges.
Andreo finally broke the silence, voice hoarse from the damp and effort. "Boss… so, what's the plan?"
Kuro's eyes lifted, scanning the room as if weighing the gravity of their next steps. The others waited, breathing shallow, wet, tense, shadows cast over their faces by the weak light from the canal entrance. Outside, the water dripped relentlessly, a metronome for the chaos they were about to face.
The room felt alive with anticipation, darkness pressing against their backs, wet clothes sticking to cold skin, minds already on the knife-edge of tension. Silence stretched, almost unbearable, until Kuro's lips moved, and the plan would finally begin.
---
Kuro stood with the map unfurled in one hand, the edges flapping faintly in the cold, damp air of the room. His thumb traced the inked lines as if feeling for a fault in the paper. The torchlight caught the hollows under his eyes; for a long moment he said nothing. Time, for him, stretched thin and taut like the rope Sinon carried — every second a small, precise risk.
At last he folded the map back halfway, pinning the route with a stubborn finger. "This is the door to the hunting grounds," he said, and the words landed like a stone. They all took a breath they hadn't known they were holding. The word hung in the air, heavy with implication; even the distant drips seemed to silence.
Only 56 said nothing. He never did. He leaned against the wall, shoulders broad but unmoving, listening. There was always that impression with 56: he was present but elsewhere, a mind working in cold gears. Tonight those gears hummed quietly; his gaze flicked from map to Kuro's face and back again, unreadable.
Kuro's voice lowered, the map pressed to his palm as if it were fragile glass. "After this room, the utility canal becomes very thin. There's nowhere to turn, no room for more than one at a time. We can't take the route any further as a group. We have to enter through here." He pointed to a small corridor branching off the main line, a narrow slit that led upward like the throat of some trapped animal.
His finger moved to the corner by the stair symbol. "Look at that corner," he said. "Do you see those black bags?" He nodded toward a shadow where limp shapes pooled against a rusted pipe. "If you go closer you'll smell it. Meat. The bodies of people who died here." His voice was clipped, clinical, but every face tightened at the image. The smell they'd all smelled in the canal — copper and rot — began crawling into their memories.
Alia stepped forward before she could stop herself, eyes narrowing. Water dripped from the brim of her hair to the floor like a slow count. "What kind of place is this?" she asked, voice raw. She felt like she might be sick; anger and disbelief fought for space in her chest.
"Don't fear," Kuro said almost immediately, as if he could will comfort into existence. "Only two Regans are present tonight. The soldiers and scientists—most are asleep. Night duty keeps a handful awake. That's why we have a window." He paused, and a small, practised calm layered over his tone. "This place is about thirty meters below the main building. There's a stair hidden behind the storage — it leads up into the basement levels. Above that, the hunting grounds door. There's a code on it."
A murmur rippled through the group. Michael's jaw clenched; Billish spat once into the puddle at his feet. Andreo's hands flexed as if preparing to punch something. Arthur's eyes, dark and intent even through exhaustion, lingered on Kuro's face — searching for hesitation, reassurance, anything.
Kuro folded the map cleanly and leaned both hands on the table. "The code can be hacked—either by 56 or by our leader," he said. He didn't name the leader; the implication was clear. "But it will take someone who can do it without triggering alarms. Once we're through that door, we have two outcomes: we either make a quiet extraction, or we engage and hunt those Regans."
He looked to 56. The tall man stepped forward then, expression still unreadable, but the air changed around him the way a calm always seemed to gather when he acted. He moved toward the map, fingers hovering above the drawn keypad, as if seeing numbers in the air. Kuro nodded. Trust was not proclaimed; it was assumed, earned in smaller, grittier ways.
Kuro then outlined the plan — precise, surgical, merciless. "We split into teams. 56, Billish, and Alia will act as bait. You'll draw the attention of Regan No. 2—Alexander. Alexander likes to engage directly; he'll come for any disturbance." Alia felt the sudden weight of the role like a stone in her stomach. Her mouth went dry; her heart hammered in a rhythm that felt both traitorous and true.
"Michael and Andreo will go after Mark." Kuro said the name with a curt nod. Mark was one of the night-hardened hunters — dangerous, unpredictable. Andreo's face set into a mask of gladness to be moving again; Michael's eyes flicked with a dangerous light.
"Kaito's father, Arthur, Sinon, and Samuel will go to the inner chamber where Kaito might be." Kuro's gaze met Arthur's for a heartbeat longer than necessary. "Samuel will be crucial. He'll remove any external alert devices—tubes, vantablack sheaths, unbilium piping—without triggering the system. He needs to be silent. If Samuel fails, the whole place rings and we're done."
Samuel, who had been conspicuously quiet up to now, looked up. His hands were stained, his sleeves clinging wet to his forearms. He nodded once, the only movement he allowed himself. There was a cold competence about him; where others looked inward at fear, Samuel had a way of making tools out of silence.
Kuro continued, voice a low grind, directing each piece of the fragile machine. "When the door opens, we have a five-minute window to get Kaito out. If we can't, we retreat. If the Regans turn violent, we hold them at bay long enough for the extraction team to carry out the kid." He swallowed, and for a moment his eyes flickered with something that could have been regret or memory.
Alia's palms were slick with water. Bait, she thought. They make me the bait. Her internal voice was furious and small at the same time. Every instinct screamed to refuse the role. And yet, beneath the rage, there was a steadier, colder current. This was what they'd trained for in darker rooms before all this: to be seen, to be taken, to let someone else move while they burned the attention. She drew breath, tasting metal. "If I'm bait," she said, loud enough for everyone, "I need an exit route. If Alexander pins me, I can't be left."
Billish barked a laugh that had no humor. "I'll move with you, girl. Alexander won't pin you without paying." He thumped a callused hand against the table, making the map shiver.
Kuro's thumb skittered over the path again. "56, you'll stay within line of sight of the door panels. If hacking fails or triggers an alarm, abort after two seconds. Billish, draw. Alia, draw as much attention as you can—yell, smash, make a mess. Michael and Andreo will take Mark's flank. Arthur, your role is to get Kaito out. Sinon will provide cover and rope extraction. Kaito's father…" Kuro paused a fraction, and his voice lowered with something like iron and mercy threaded together. "Kaito's father will be in the extraction team. He knows his son—if anyone can carry him, it's him."
Arthur's chest tightened, an animalistic reflex that he could not entirely cloak. If it's him, he thought, I will carry Kaito myself. The image took him like a punch: the child's face, pale and slack, connected to machines that hummed with cold life. He clenched his wet hands until the nails bit his palms.
Kuro's eyes swept the room as if checking a clock visible only to him. "We rest for fifteen minutes," he said. "Dress, dry as much as you can. We move by twos; silence until we reach the stair. Once we reach the steps, there's a service hatch that leads up into the storage corridor. That's where the door is."
Sinon checked the rope at her waist, the strands slick. "Two of us on the stair at a time," she said softly. "Slow, shoulder-to-shoulder. No clatter." Her voice, always more action than words, carried the weight of experience. When she looked at Arthur, brief warmth softened her features; they'd pulled each other through worse. That small human thing steadied him.
Kuro rolled the map back into its pouch and handed it to 56. "We move now," he said. "Samuel, get ready. Arthur, stay close to Kaito's father—if he collapses, be ready to lift him." He looked at Alia with something that almost resembled an apology. "Be careful," he said. The words were small, inadequate, but they were the only currency left for things like regret.
Alia's response was a barely audible snarl. "Always am," she muttered, because defiance was easier than permission. The group fell into a rehearsed, ragged quiet. Clothes clung to their bodies in dark, routed shapes; their boots left shallow, sodden prints. The smell from the corner gnawed at them like an animal.
Kuro took a breath that drew the room with him, then turned to lead. For a second he hesitated at the threshold as if feeling the gravity of the climb. The stair waited like an open wound leading upward. Above them, the main building slept — or pretended to — its lights dim, its corridors full of dreams and electrical hums. Below, the canal had claimed secrets and stilled voices; that knowledge sat heavy in their bellies.
"We do this clean," Kuro said. "We do this fast. We do this now."
The team tightened into their chosen pairs and moved like a single dark organism toward the narrow slit where the canal thinned. Each step made their sodden clothes cling tighter, each breath tasted of iron and cold. The map in 56's hands had been folded away, but the route unfurled inside every one of them — an imprint of lines and danger they could not unlearn.
As they entered the thin corridor, the oppressive silence pressed in again. None of them spoke. The plan was set, roles distributed, the fragile hope packed into a handful of minutes. Above all of them, the hunting grounds door waited behind layers of steel and code, and the hunted — Kaito, caged by unknown apparatus — waited, unaware and vulnerable.
Kuro's last thought as they began the climb was not strategy but a small, private fear: that in the machinery of rescue the one thing they could not calculate was the human heart — which would cry out, betray positions, falter, or steady in unpredictable ways. He pushed the thought down and climbed. The darkness swallowed them, and their wet figures disappeared into the throat of the stair.
---
At first, the corridor felt almost unnervingly empty. The narrow walls, slick with condensation, echoed only with the soft squelch of water-soaked boots and the muted rustle of wet clothing. Each step forward pressed on their senses; every drip from the ceiling sounded louder than it should, bouncing off the cold metal pipes like a sinister drumbeat. For a fleeting moment, there was a fragile sense of calm—the illusion that perhaps the worst of the canal was behind them, and now they merely had to navigate a stairwell and a forgotten hallway to reach the main building.
But illusions never lasted long in places like this.
A sudden pop and sizzle ripped through the air. Sparks danced along the exposed wires clinging to the ceiling, and the faint hum of electricity died abruptly. Light vanished. The corridor plunged into blackness. The group froze, hearts hammering. Instinctively, hands went to torches, but before anyone could strike a flame, movement emerged from the darkness—a figure stepping silently from the shadows.
Billish's muscles tensed. Her usual grin was replaced by a small, hesitant smile, the kind that trembled on the edge of fear. "I… I am the god of death," he said, voice low but deliberate, a strange mixture of awe, hesitation, and recognition. The name hung in the air like an omen.
Kuro's eyes narrowed. "That's Mark," he said simply. No introduction, no hesitation. Just the weight of a name, heavy and precise.
The figure became clearer in the faint glow of the sparks, a surreal, almost unearthly presence. Mark was clean, his white scythe gleaming unnaturally, surrounded by a subtle red aura that seemed to pulse against the darkness. His hair was black, eyes deeper and darker than the shadows themselves, and his form—short, about 162 centimeters—belied his deadly precision. Though he looked like a boy of twenty-three, every movement exuded lethal control.
Before anyone could react further, Mark lunged. The scythe arced through the air with deadly grace, aimed at the center of the group. Reflexes collided with strategy: Andreo raised his sickle, muscles coiling, the metal ringing against the edge of Mark's weapon. Michael's staff met the other side, a violent clash of impact that threw sparks into the surrounding darkness. Both men were drenched, exhausted from the canal, their breaths ragged, muscles screaming in protest. Yet they held.
The energy of the strike sent them staggering, their legs quivering under the weight of fatigue. Sweat and water mingled in their hair, and even the normally unflappable Mark faltered slightly under the combined force. Then, Andreo and Michael did something unexpected. In a fluid motion, almost choreographed, they dragged Mark toward a metal grating that overlooked the stairwell leading into the hunting grounds. The scythe struck again and again, a cacophony of metal and force, but finally, Mark was forced off balance. With a scream that was half rage, half disbelief, he fell thirty meters downward into the abyss of the hunting grounds below.
Andreo's voice carried over the crash, strained but commanding: "We'll hold him off!"
For a heartbeat, there was a sense of relief. But as the echoes of Mark's fall faded, another tension grew. Billish, Alia, and 56 shifted direction, moving swiftly toward another corridor—a path that had the potential to intersect with Alexander. Their boots slapped against the wet floor, bodies pressed low, shadows stretching unnaturally long against the walls.
Kuro, Arthur, Samuel, Sinon, and Kaito's father went another way—or perhaps, vanished into the darkness itself. The corridor swallowed them like a living thing, leaving only faint impressions of their movements and the distant drip of water to trace their presence.
56 suddenly halted mid-step. His eyes, cold and calculating as ever, narrowed. "Wait," he muttered, voice almost inaudible, "I sense someone."
Billish glanced at him. "Alexander?" he asked cautiously.
"No," 56 corrected, tone clipped. "Six people."
Billish's brow furrowed. "Six people… running?" Her mind raced, calculating distances, possible engagement, escape routes.
They advanced cautiously, shadows clinging to their wet, clinging clothes. The hallway twisted sharply to the left, a corner they had to navigate. As Billish prepared to bend the corner, he caught movement—a group at the intersection, frozen in position.
Time seemed to stretch and distort. The world slowed, every drop of water in the air suspended like crystal. Billish's eyes widened, heart hammering. From his vantage, he could see them clearly now.
Two girls with red hair, their movements precise and purposeful, scanning the hallway like predators. A man in a suit stood behind them, exuding an aura of authority and control; his black hair was slick, eyes black and unyielding. Beside him, a figure in a bloodied hospital coat shifted, its appearance horrifying and surreal in the dim light. The fabric clung to them like wet leather, streaks of red staining pale skin.
Two more figures flanked the group. One carried a set of knives, each blade catching the faint light, eyes cold and calculated. The last figure smiled—too wide, too sharp, the kind of smile that unsettled even the most composed. A trace of white powder dusted his nose, an enigmatic mark of something deeper, something wild.
Billish froze, breath caught, unable to reconcile the image before him. Six people, fully visible, fully dangerous, fully alive in the shadowed corner—and yet time itself seemed paused. They held their positions, frozen as though aware of his gaze, and in that moment, the corridor became more than just a passageway. It was a crucible.
Alia pressed herself against the wall behind Billish, water dripping from her hair into her eyes. Her pulse raced, every muscle taut. This is insane, she thought. We've survived the canal, fought off Mark, and now this… Six people, poised, like a trap. The smell of metal and wet and fear is suffocating. And somehow… I feel their intent. They aren't just waiting—they're testing us.
56's gaze did not waver. Calm, precise, he read the stance of the six like lines of code, understanding their capabilities without needing words. "We have to split their attention," he muttered, more to himself than anyone else. "If we hesitate, even a second… it's over."
Billish swallowed. The grin returned, hesitant and tight. "Right. Attention. Let's go." But even as She moved, a weight pressed down on her shoulders—the knowledge that this confrontation was not just physical. It was psychological, a test of composure, precision, and endurance. The corridor, damp and narrow, became a pressure chamber, squeezing every ounce of confidence from them.
Kuro's voice echoed faintly from the other path, a reminder of the bigger plan. Arthur, Sinon, Samuel, and Kaito's father had already begun their infiltration, leaving Billish, Alia, and 56 with this moment of tension and danger. Every heartbeat, every step mattered. The red-haired girls' eyes flicked toward him, their presence demanding acknowledgment, demanding strategy.
The man in the suit shifted slightly, and the bloodied figure beside him adjusted its stance. The knife-wielding girl flexed her fingers, blades glinting, ready. The smiling figure inhaled sharply through the nose, white powder glinting faintly in the darkness. Each one of them radiated a dangerous energy that made the wet walls of the corridor feel narrower, more oppressive.
Billish exhaled slowly. We have to move,she thought. No hesitation. One mistake, one breath too loud, and it's over. The hallway itself feels alive, like it's waiting to crush us. She glanced at Alia and 56. Alia's jaw was set, eyes blazing behind wet strands of hair. 56's gaze cut through the gloom with surgical precision. Together, they were the spearpoint of the plan, carrying the weight of engagement, bait, and tactical observation.
And in that suspended moment, Billish realized the corridor was not just a passage. It was a threshold. Beyond it, danger had taken form. Beyond it, the psychological weight of their choices—the canal, Mark, the hunting grounds, the Regans—pressured them like an unseen hand. And yet, they had no choice but to move forward.
Time resumed. The six figures at the corner flickered into motion, fluid, predatory. The moment ended; the tension snapped. Wet shoes slapped against the corridor floor as Billish, Alia, and 56 lunged into motion, preparing for engagement or evasion, the unknown six charging or reacting in perfect synchronization. Shadows danced violently along the walls, the smell of damp metal and iron thickened.
And then the chapter ended, suspended in an almost unbearable tension. The wet, dark corridor, the six unknown figures, and the poised, exhausted heroes—every element of dread, strategy, and uncertainty converged in a single heartbeat. Nothing had resolved; everything threatened to erupt.
The hunting grounds were waiting. And so were the Regans.